The Hundred-Character Tablet

The Hundred-Character Tablet

Nurturing energy, forget words and guard it.
Conquer the mind, do nondoing.
In activity and quietude, know the source progenitor.
There is no thing; whom else do you seek?
Real constancy should respond to people;

In responding to people, it is essential not to get confused.
When you don’t get confused, your nature is naturally stable;
when your nature is stable, energy naturally returns.
When energy returns, elixir spontaneously crytallizes,
in the port pairing water and fire.
Yin and Yang arise, alternating over and over again,
everywhere producing the sound of thunder.
White clouds assemble on the summit,
sweet dew bathes the polar mountain.
Having drunk the wine of longevity,
you wander free, who can know you?
You sit and listen to the stringless tune,
you clearly understand the mechanism of creation.
The whole of these twenty verses
is a ladder straight to heaven.

(Lu Yan/Lu Dongbin)